That some dialects of Arabic negate with a pre-posed mā alone, some with what is called ‘bipartite’ negation mā … š, and some with post-positive -š alone has invited comparisons with a similar ...
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That some dialects of Arabic negate with a pre-posed mā alone, some with what is called ‘bipartite’ negation mā … š, and some with post-positive -š alone has invited comparisons with a similar process, called Jespersen’s Cycle, said to have occurred in French, whereby the pre-posed negator ne became associated with an emphatic post-positive particle pas ‘step’—and, in some French vernaculars, with a post-positive pas alone. Yet the similarity between Arabic and French is purely superficial, lacking supporting linguistic evidence. Forcing the facts of Arabic into preconceived theoretical constructs, both formal and functional, engenders erroneous conclusions. The source of the Arabic negator -š is polar interrogation, for which evidence does indeed exist in various Arabic dialects, including Andalusi, Egyptian, Levantine, Maltese, Tunisian, and Yemeni. The polar interrogative šī, itself derived from an existential particle, ultimately arose from the Proto-Semitic presentative ša and 3rd person pronouns šū, šī, and šunu. Supporting evidence for this comes from the West Semitic Modern South Arabian languages, which possess an existential particle, an indefinite determiner, and inchoate interrogative śi analogous in form and function to that of the Arabic šī. With this, it becomes possible to propose the operation of a different cycle in Arabic: the negative-existential (or Croft’s) cycle. Such comparative evidence from Arabic dialects and sister languages, along with historical records of an Arab presence in the Fertile Crescent centuries before the arrival of Arabic speaking Muslims in the 7th century AD, provides convincing evidence for the antiquity of the Arabic dialects.Less

Arabic Indefinites, Interrogatives, and Negators : A Linguistic History of Western Dialects

David Wilmsen

Published in print: 2014-10-30

That some dialects of Arabic negate with a pre-posed mā alone, some with what is called ‘bipartite’ negation mā … š, and some with post-positive -š alone has invited comparisons with a similar process, called Jespersen’s Cycle, said to have occurred in French, whereby the pre-posed negator ne became associated with an emphatic post-positive particle pas ‘step’—and, in some French vernaculars, with a post-positive pas alone. Yet the similarity between Arabic and French is purely superficial, lacking supporting linguistic evidence. Forcing the facts of Arabic into preconceived theoretical constructs, both formal and functional, engenders erroneous conclusions. The source of the Arabic negator -š is polar interrogation, for which evidence does indeed exist in various Arabic dialects, including Andalusi, Egyptian, Levantine, Maltese, Tunisian, and Yemeni. The polar interrogative šī, itself derived from an existential particle, ultimately arose from the Proto-Semitic presentative ša and 3rd person pronouns šū, šī, and šunu. Supporting evidence for this comes from the West Semitic Modern South Arabian languages, which possess an existential particle, an indefinite determiner, and inchoate interrogative śi analogous in form and function to that of the Arabic šī. With this, it becomes possible to propose the operation of a different cycle in Arabic: the negative-existential (or Croft’s) cycle. Such comparative evidence from Arabic dialects and sister languages, along with historical records of an Arab presence in the Fertile Crescent centuries before the arrival of Arabic speaking Muslims in the 7th century AD, provides convincing evidence for the antiquity of the Arabic dialects.